Cincinnati Blues

On a recent flight from Rome to Atlanta, Morgantina sat beside a delightful pilgrim from the Cincinnati area. The slip of paper with her name and e-mail address has been misplaced, and it’s a disappointment to go to Cincinnati without making contact. We’d never have chosen to check out the ‘Nati if it weren’t for this woman. Did she divulge some secrets about Cincinnati or tell Morgantina where to go or eat? No. She’s was just so utterly pleasant that we wanted to see where a person like that hails from.

Nothing we know about Cincinnati is useful. Ken Anderson and the Bengals lost Super Bowl XVI to Joe Montana and the 49ers in 1982. The last line of the WKRP in Cincinnati theme song is "I’m at WKRP in Cincinnati” which goes unsung when Morgantina sings instead “I’m going to Kansas City, Kansas City here I come.” We don’t think it’s an omen or a subconscious affinity for Wilbert Harrison, but it may be proof that our hearts are elsewhere. And, in fact, writing about the Queen City is a drag.

Like any other city of its size (330K and over 2 million in the metro) it has museums, a zoo, botanical garden, amusement parks, friendly library staff at the local libraries, opera – think Kathleen Battle - and professional sports. In addition it boasts the largest Octoberfest in America, the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center and tons of chili. When we asked locals what they liked most about living in the area we heard the phrase, “it’s home” most often. We got the distinct impression that people living outside of Cincinnati proper most liked that they didn’t live in Cincinnati. When asked what they disliked most crime topped the list. Lack of diversity and traffic were also mentioned.

Random Cincinnati:

Mt. Adams: Mt. Adams is described by some as San Francisco-like. We thought the comparison a two thousand mile stretch. It’s a compact hilly neighborhood in Cincinnati’s East end. Colorful, overpriced Victorian homes are convenient to Eden Park, home of the Cincinnati Museum of Art. If we had to live in the city, we’d live here. There’s a plenty of green alongside plentiful food and drink. United Dairy Farmers has the best peach ice cream and it gets five cows. It was time to leave when vacuous thirty-something posturing prospectors in ill-fitting suits started pointing at vacant storefronts with Blackberries in hand and telling tales of just how many e-mails they receive each day.

Chili: It’s not twelve alarm and it doesn’t have beans. It’s more like a Greek inspired stew served atop spaghetti or hot dogs, with or without cheese, onions and beans. Cinnamon and cloves feature prominently with the chili powder and cumin. It’s fantastic and flavor reminiscent of our French-Canadian gorton/creton. Skyline Chili and Camp Washington Chili were our favorites.

Hyde Park Gourmet Food and Wine: (Really more spirits than food). At the suggestion of the amicable beer advocate, Nelson, Pellew picked up a fine six pack of the Cincinnati based Mt. Carmel’s Blonde Ale. A lengthy discussion about palate and taste ensued with the copious use of the terms differentials, regionals and regions. After a bit of head scratching and an invisible decoder, we deduced these terms could only have been intended to convey differences, preferences and reasons for drinking beer.

Personalities: Chummed it up with Christian Bradley of Fly Society Entertainment who was interviewed for Cincinnati Magazine's monthly Style Counsel section. Had a conversation with an itinerant raccoon which behaved much like a peckish canine.

Fini.

To GPS or not to GPS?

Morgantina loves maps, atlases, guidebooks and all their variations. When driving in a a smaller area she really prefers regional maps drawn on a 1:25,000 scale. They're most useful for finding alternate routes, short cuts, nature areas, less publicized archaeological sites, chapels and Madonna shrines. You can't go wrong with these maps detailing major and minor routes, rough stretches and goat paths. They're perfect for finding the a good shortcut without having to rely on the highway; and that was always Morgantina's goal until driving in the heart of Sicily where sign post, map and road don't speak the same language.



While Morgantina likes the challenge of finding her way in and out of a town using map (when at hand), street signs and intuition. Pellew tolerates this tendency more than he appreciates it. Morgantina reasons that her preferred system works all the time because they've always made it home. But this method isn't without its drawbacks since there must be ample time and patience, both of which have been known to wane at an accelerated rate when physiology is a factor.

For this journey Pellew insisted on using a GPS. Morgantina concedes its usefulness. GPS will always tell you where in the world you are. That's a comfort. Want to go to the movies? Just tap on the screen. Craving sushi? Query and ye shall receive a moderately accurate listing of bars probably still in business. Directions to base camp in rural WV? Sure. 3 routes. 2 of which are navigable atop a snorting quadruped, not the XB.

Morgantina hypothesized all the adventure and spontaneity of the trip would be negated by a satellite signal. Geographic ineptitude would increase as navigable skill decreased: a classic inverse relationship between woman and machine. GPS isn't emboldened with conviction or guts. At least when we'd mistake East for West at midday we'd be attuned and engaged with interpretation of the landscape, signs, markers, constructively figuring out how to get to our destination. We'd argue a point. GPS's mistakes would yield a blameless and heartless situation of foggy recalculation. When GPS gets it wrong, we'd be missing what the land and sky are trying to tell us. We might as well don the blinders as we're hunched over stupidly punching at the screen begging GPS to lead us in the right direction. But Morgantina could be wrong.